It's been almost 100 years since Wassily Kandinsky began creating what are generally regarded as the first purely abstract paintings. The Russian's "compositions," as he termed them, freed him from representation and opened up a new world of expressive possibilities. These were fully explored in the 1950s by the painters of the New York School (Jackson Pollock, Franz Kline, Willem de Kooning and others).
These days, abstract painting has lost much of its appeal. Once the most revolutionary means of expression available to the artist, it now ranks as one of the safest.
The "Visions of Contemporary Art" exhibition, held each March at Tokyo's Ueno Royal Museum, is a showcase of 33 youngish (under-40) artists, each nominated by a prominent critic, professor or curator from a distinct region in Japan. There is an understanding among nominators to put painting ahead of the more popular contemporary art mediums such as photography, video and installation, and as such there is a lot of abstract painting at VOCA.